I thought that we should have a thread where we can submit ideas for our respective conlangs which we are not sure about, for others to judge or give their opinion on.

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My first issue is whether I should introduce a new system of so called null-object descriptives. These are 9 suffixes added to verb stems to give further information about the object of a verb (the pronoun form has no surface form, which is why it is called null-object descriptives). Additionally, the suffixes can be used on the copula to further describe there-existential phrases/verbs. The suffixes describe form or shape of the object or copula-argument.

For example, the suffix -aht- refers to large and formless, scattered, enclosed, contained, dead or bound/wrapped objects. Example;

kiggahtaįa on, hokatatievlia de suvo
[ˈcʰik:ahtɑjãɔ̃ hɔkɑtɑˈtiel:ia de ˈsuvɔ]Ø-ki<gg>-aht-a-įa-Ø on hoka-ta-Ø-tievl-i-ade suvo-Ø
tr-pick.up.past-ahta-ass.concl.tr-3p.pat.pl-3p.act.ag.sg on down-3p.act.unag.sg-tr-miss-past-ass.cocnl.tr de berry-dat
‘X dropped the berries down and picked them up (from being scattered/into a container/gathered together)’

Coming up with a phonology for that language that creatures without Human-like mouths could pronounce. Here's what I have...

/n̪ n ɲ/
/t̪ d̪ t d k q/
/s z ʒ ç ʝ h/
/l/
/ʑ/
/dʑ/

My main question is with /ʑ/ and /dʑ/ - does it make more sense to have those since I have /ʒ/? I figure that they are along similar points of articulation. I just don't think about affricates or co-articulated consonants much, I focus on the pulmonic consonants...

I'm also not sure about /t̪/ or /d̪/ - would it be strange to leave them out, since as I have /n̪/?

Yay or nay on any of these things?

I'd also vote aye on Monoba's idea. Nicely concise, and also adds flavour (especially with me being a native English speaker).

My main question is with /ʑ/ and /dʑ/ - does it make more sense to have those since I have /ʒ/? I figure that they are along similar points of articulation. I just don't think about affricates or co-articulated consonants much, I focus on the pulmonic consonants...

That's a hard question.
You have some palatal consonant, so /ʑ dʑ/ wouldn't be strange. You have /ʒ/ (with no other postalv consonant) what makes /ʒ ʑ ʝ/ too much for such a small phonemy.

What sound inventory could be pronounced by aliens without human mouths?

I think that the answer to this question is going to depend on what kinds of speech production organs the aliens do have.

An alien vocal tract might include nostrils that could be opened and closed to make plosives and fricatives; teeth-like projections on the tongue and tough ridges on the surrounding cavity that could facilitate non-human taps and clicks; the use of more than one valve in the vocal tract to produce staggered or simultaneous glottal noises....I'm sure that an anatomist with a science-fiction writer's imagination could come up with a longer list.

It's important to remember that aliens might not use their mouths for speech. The airway and the digestive tract might not intersect in an alien species. What is more, strictly speaking, humans don't have any speech organs. Everything we use in order to produce speech has some other, more important function, such as eating or protecting the airway. Our vocal tract is *adapted* for speech, but an alien's body might have some other body parts adapted for communication.

Since you're talking about making a human sound inventory that aliens without human mouths could produce, I assume that
you're ruling out the idea that the alien speech production organs might be like a parrot's, which can imitate all kinds of human speech, or even better, like the membrane on a loudspeaker, which might produce almost any sound at all.

In short, I think you should decide what kind of speech production organs your aliens have before you come up with your inventory.

Rainchild wrote:What sound inventory could be pronounced by aliens without human mouths?

I think that the answer to this question is going to depend on what kinds of speech production organs the aliens do have.

An alien vocal tract might include nostrils that could be opened and closed to make plosives and fricatives; teeth-like projections on the tongue and tough ridges on the surrounding cavity that could facilitate non-human taps and clicks; the use of more than one valve in the vocal tract to produce staggered or simultaneous glottal noises....I'm sure that an anatomist with a science-fiction writer's imagination could come up with a longer list.

It's important to remember that aliens might not use their mouths for speech. The airway and the digestive tract might not intersect in an alien species. What is more, strictly speaking, humans don't have any speech organs. Everything we use in order to produce speech has some other, more important function, such as eating or protecting the airway. Our vocal tract is *adapted* for speech, but an alien's body might have some other body parts adapted for communication.

Since you're talking about making a human sound inventory that aliens without human mouths could produce, I assume that
you're ruling out the idea that the alien speech production organs might be like a parrot's, which can imitate all kinds of human speech, or even better, like the membrane on a loudspeaker, which might produce almost any sound at all.

In short, I think you should decide what kind of speech production organs your aliens have before you come up with your inventory.

Jim G.

I'm working with the equivalent to weres (not full transformation, more humanoid...and humanoid is so ugly a word in this case, but it's probably the best way to say not Twilight or American Werewolf in London weres :P), so they can pronounce pretty similar sounds. But having muzzles does have a marked impact, especially since even with lips, they can't round them the same way, and they would be positioned differently to a Human's. I have even chucked out labio-dentals, although having the labio-dental nasal as a phoneme would be fun (no recorded language appears to have it as a phoneme, only an allophone).

Erm...maybe my post and Rainchild's could be put into the non-Human mouths thread? I don't wish to derail this one. And my other post might be best in the Q & A thread, come to think of it...

MONOBA wrote:I thought that we should have a thread where we can submit ideas for our respective conlangs which we are not sure about, for others to judge or give their opinion on.

==

My first issue is whether I should introduce a new system of so called null-object descriptives. These are 9 suffixes added to verb stems to give further information about the object of a verb (the pronoun form has no surface form, which is why it is called null-object descriptives). Additionally, the suffixes can be used on the copula to further describe there-existential phrases/verbs. The suffixes describe form or shape of the object or copula-argument.

For example, the suffix -aht- refers to large and formless, scattered, enclosed, contained, dead or bound/wrapped objects. Example;

kiggahtaįa on, hokatatievlia de suvo
[ˈcʰik:ahtɑjãɔ̃ hɔkɑtɑˈtiel:ia de ˈsuvɔ]Ø-ki<gg>-aht-a-įa-Ø on hoka-ta-Ø-tievl-i-ade suvo-Ø
tr-pick.up.past-ahta-ass.concl.tr-3p.pat.pl-3p.act.ag.sg on down-3p.act.unag.sg-tr-miss-past-ass.cocnl.tr de berry-dat
‘X dropped the berries down and picked them up (from being scattered/into a container/gathered together)’

Oops, my bad. Not all of the personal prefixes (when arguments of stative verbs) would be patientives. Also, I just decided that "cuki" (to see) is not a patientive transitive verb. "ak" (to stab) works better.